Dark Chocolate American Buttercream

If you’re looking for extreme dark chocolatey icing, look no further. This Dark Chocolate American Buttercream is so satisfyingly sweet, smooth, creamy, fluffy, and buttery chocolate explosion. It’s so dark in color from the Dutch processed cocoa, it’s almost black, and has deep chocolatey notes that will please your palate. I could go on and on about this lovely icing…

Eat it by the spoonful or frost some cupcakes, cookies or a decadent cake. For me, this particular icing complements my homemade very best chocolate cake so perfectly. I cut into many layers, fill it with a rich chocolate mousse and add some chocolate chips for some crunch, or maybe fresh raspberries if I’m feeling a bit sophisticated. Break up the chocolate party a bit! Lastly, ice the cake with this fabulous chocolate icing, and make sure to top it off with chocolate decorations. If that’s not enough chocolate I don’t know what is. I’ll certainly make this for you all later this year!

My husband and little guy are not chocolate fans though…always so disappointing. And I, on the other hand, just love chocolate cake, so I need an excuse to make it! Blog post coming soon!

This past week, for my birthday, I got a new KitchenAid Mixer. Ahh…I can’t tell you how excited I was. I’ve been wanting one forever. The one I have now is about thirty years old and really only has one speed, and it’s speed ten. If I’m not careful, everything flies out of the bowl onto me and everywhere, just everywhere! I’m not sure why I even try sometimes! Clean up was always a days process or more. I still find cocoa powder every now and then. But my birthday morning was fabulous. I got up and right there, that morning, on my counter was the most beautiful, candy apple red, glass bowl, six quart mixer. It sits there, completing my kitchen, looking so gorgeous! I got off topic a bit, but back to the icing…

To make this perfect chocolate frosting, get you mixer out and start creaming your butter until it’s light in color and fluffy. Scrape your bowl and add the cocoa powder, powdered sugar and salt. Mix together, making sure it’s completely combined. It’ll be a bit thick at this point. Scrape your bowl once more and add vanilla and the hot water (this melts the sugar and gives the icing that extra smooth texture). Don’t add all the water at once because you may not need all of it. If you want a thicker, fudge like icing, don’t add all of the water. If you want a fluffier, thinner icing, add most or all of the water. You have complete control over the consistency. Mix, mix, mix for about five minutes. It’ll lighten in color a bit and, you’ll want to achieve a smooth, fluffy, creamy texture. Give it a try. It’s seriously melt in your mouth addicting. It’s now ready to use! Ice your favorite cake, cookies or cupcakes!